Quick take.
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May 6, 2021, 5:26 PM, December 2, 2021, 12:32 PM.
Is a temporary waiver of Covid-19 vaccine patents helpful or harmful to global vaccine equity? The debate was mapped by Marc Davies.
A group of nations continues to push a proposal at the World Trade Organization to lift intellectual property protections for makers of the vaccines. The latest coronaviruses variant, omicron, has brought more attention to the need to speed up the production of vaccines in the developing world. Critics of the waiver say that it undermines the incentives that led to the rapid development of the vaccines and wouldn't have any practical effect.
In October 2020, India and South Africa introduced a proposal to temporarily waive enforcement of certain provisions of the WTO Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights. Intellectual property rules governing the production of diagnostics, therapeutic, vaccines, medical devices, and personal protective equipment used to fight the Covid pandemic should be removed. Proponents of the waiver say it would provide legal certainty for governments, companies and individuals to produce life-saving pharmaceuticals in places that currently lack significant access to them.
